The Contact Center Supply Chain: Framework, Problems, and Solutions

Vijay Mehrotra
Vice President, Blue Pumpkin Software

Abstract: More than 3% of all Americans work in contact centers, and the cost of labor typically 60-70% of a call center's operating budget. In this context, the management challenge is in balancing the need for high-quality service delivery with cost-effective human resource deployment, all of which must be done in the context of a highly dynamic but uncertain workload and a myriad of labor supply constraints.

In this presentation, I will provide a framework for the management of a contact center's "human supply chain" and identify a number of challenging and important quantitative problems. In addition, I will present two specific solutions that illustrate the business value of embedding intelligent but tractable mathematical models within an organization's information systems and management processes.